Dont you people watch the crown . The royals are my life youre a bunch of monsters theme song playing announcer its the late show with Stephen Colbert tonight, the more you know, plus stephen welcomes senator Bernie Sanders and penn badgley, featuring jon batiste and stay human. And now, live on tape from the ed sullivan theater in new york city, its Stephen Colbert cheers and applause band playing stephen come on hey welcome back its perfect its perfect who i think its the right thing to do, actually. Wow. Thank you, ladies and gentlemen. Please, have a seat. Welcome to the late show. Im your host Stephen Colbert. cheers and applause thank you for that. I need it tonight. Some days the news is frustrating. And by some days, i mean every day for the last three years. But today is especially irksome. I am fully irked. Trump is really irking me off. See, its been a couple days the worlds sphincter is finally unclenching. Now, with the perspective of time, we can ask, was any of this legal . The Administration Says yes. The drone strike was completely justified, because they were heading off an imminent attack. Might be true. But, so far, trump hasnt provided any evidence of that, or told anyone what the attack would have been. Yesterday, Trump Administration officials delivered a classified briefing to members of congress. And not everybody gave it a rave. Some gave it a rant, like utah republican senator and man definitely not snapping on the beat, mike lee. Lee described the meeting where the administration was supposed to explain the justification for the attack this way probably the worst briefing ive seen, at least on a military issue, in the nine years ive served on the United States senate. They kept telling us that there would have been an imminent attack had they not taken this strike on friday. But then when we would ask them, what was the nature of that attack . When and where would that have been occurred . By whom would it have been carried it out . , they refused to answer the question. Stephen and thats the only reason for the meeting. Thats like a doctor saying, we have the results of your m. R. I. , but i refuse to show them to you. So what do you want to talk about . Hey, have you finished binging the witcher on netflix yet . Id get to that in the next couple of weeks, if i were you. laughter piano riff not only are they not providing any information to congress, briefers were even shushing lawmakers who asked tough questions. Okay, that ones fine. Remember what James Madison said to john adams at the Constitutional Convention about the separation of powers shut your dirty little mouth laughter senator lee, who again, is a republican, says the censorship went even further than that what i found so distressing about that briefing was that one of the messages we received from the briefers was do not debate, do not discuss the issue of further military intervention against iran, and that if you do, youll be emboldening iran. Stephen of course, iran wants nothing more than forcing the great satan to have a functioning democracy. Dont forget their rallying cry, reasoned debate to america lee says that not only was the briefing horrible, the portions were so small they had to leave after 75 minutes. Stephen 75 minutes is shorter than the opening credits of the irishman lee wrapped up his criticism of the briefing by telling us how he really felt. I find this insulting. And demeaning. Not personally, but to the office that each of the 100 senators in this building happens to hold. I find it insulting, and i find it demeaning to the constitution of the United States. Stephen damn right, mike cheers and applause yes you may be republican, but yes oh, hell, yes senator, im going to ruin your political career by agreeing with you. laughter hes absolutely right hes absolutely right this is insulting. piano riff this is insulting. Not just to congress to the American People. Has everyone already forgotten what happens when we dont ask for concrete evidence justifying a military attack against a middle eastern country whose name begins with ira . laughter obviously, we know what that was last time obviously, the war in iraq was a big, fat mistake. laughter stephen thank you, more recent mistake. laughter cheers and applause piano riff heres the difference here it is jon come on, now stephen listen up heres the difference between 2003 and now i weigh 30 pounds more. laughter heres another one heres another one back then, george w. Bush respected us enough to put some effort into his lies. Remember . as bush Saddam Hussein has mobile weapons labs that ride the rails made of aluminum tubes that can deliver 50,000 barrels of Honey Mustard gas hidden on a turkey farm. Saddam will attack us with humananimal hybrids. laughter they even sent colin powell to the u. N. To shake his cocaine vial full of sweet n low, and claim if he opened it, it would kill everyone from here to westchester. laughter and hed love to show us the evidence, but that would ruin everything. We just had to trust them and their buddy curveball. Well, 17 years later, here we are again. Worst Throwback Thursday ever. laughter cheers and applause and heres another difference. Heres another difference. Trump doesnt even have a colin powell. They dont have someone with a reputation worth flushing down the toilet. The best they can scrape together is the mike pence experience we have to protect sources and methods, and so theres only a certain amount that we can share with every member of congress, but those of us who have seen all the evidence know that there is a compelling case of an imminent threat. Stephen get that . Pence has seen all the evidence. But you wont ever see it, because it goes to another school, in canada. And it is super hot. laughter and he totally got to third base with it, which for mike pence, is share froyo. laughter i say, before we give the president the authority to attack another middle eastern country, we must demand better a,ome of whopper. ch and applaus our taxes, your taxes, my taxes, our taxes pay for all these lies put some effort into it dazzle and deceive us sell it with some sizzle scare the bleep out of us cheers and applause but just try but one senator was deeply grateful for all the nothing they got South Carolina senator and frog who got kissed and turned into Lindsay Graham laughter lindsey graham. He was asked about whether congress should ever get to learn anything about the justification for this attack from the president does the administration not have a duty to disclose some of what they know specifically when they come to congress . The way we found this out, well never tell anybody, it was magical, and we wont compromise it. Stephen yes, it was magical. Would youreich a justification . All right, all right, pick a justification, any justification. All right, dont look at it. Now, put it back into the deck. Briefing over laughter cheers and applause today, trump was asked about senator lee trashing his intelligence briefing, and he had this to lie i had calls from numerous senators and numerous congressmen and women saying it was the greatest presentation theyve ever had people have called and they said it was the best presentation theyve ever seen. Stephen as trump yes, numerous real people told me that. Like who . Um, senator guy trueperson and congresswoman notalie actuallady. Trump also spoke about Environmental Concerns mainly, his concern that the environment was getting in the way of building stuff. But he had an answer. Well cut the federal permitting timeline for Major Projects down to two years, and ideally were going to try to get even less than that, so youll be instead of 21, 22, 25, 9, 12, 15. Stephen he must be fun on new years eve. laughter as trump ten, nine, eight, 12, four, 22, 15, with a powerball of eight. laughter cheers and applause trump said he got no credit for donating his president ial salary to charity, but he said it this way. I give up my salary its 450,000, approximately 450,000 president ial salary i give it up, it goes to. Usually, i give it to drugs. laughter cheers and applause stephen mmm clearly, thats not what he meant. But the flub is understandable. Hes on a ton of adderall allegedly. Now sniffing when asked about the n. A. T. O. Alliance in europe, trump floated an exciting idea spice it up with some noneurope countries. I spoke to the secretary general yesterday and we had a great conversation. He was very i think he was actually excited by it. I actuly had a name. Nato, right . And then you have me, middle east. You call it natome. I said, what a beautiful name. Natome. Stephen as trump beautiful name. Natome. How lovely. If i ever have a child, ill name it natome. What . Youre kidding. Really . Five laughter jon aaahhh applause stephen by the way, just to take a second here to break that down, n. A. T. O. Stands for North Atlantic Treaty Organization middle east. laughter thats what he is suggesting is a perfect name laughter why not just do the Gilligans Island rule and go North Atlantic Treaty Organization and the rest is this laughter applause now, trump cheers and applause jon i like that. Stephen trump continued to wax poetic about his naming ability. Im good at names. Right . U. S. M. C. A. Like the song y. M. C. A. Everybody nobody could remember u. S. M. C. A. , i said think of the song y. M. C. A. Now everybody says it. Stephen wait a second, let me see a wide shot of that press conference. Cowboys. Construction workers. Does trump think hes in the Village People . Get out of there, mike pence its not your scene weve got a great show for you tonight. Bernie sanders is here. Stick around cheers and applause band playing cheers and applause band playing stephen wow welcome back, everybody ladies and gentlemen, give it up for the band, jon batiste and stay human, right over there come on youve got to bark it off tonight. cheers and applause stephen jon, any minute Bernie Sanders is going to be out here, but before we do that, one quick announcement next week, we are live, ladies and gentlemen, live after the democratic debate in iowa, tuesday night well be live here from the ed sullivan theater. My guest that night will be someone whos a candidate not in the debate, mayor bloomberg will be here that night. cheers and applause jon new york city new york city stephen who has been here before. Jon mmhmm. Stephen folks, my first guest is an independent senator from vermont who wants to be our next president. Please welcome senator bernie rsndying stephen sir, good to see you, welcome back good to be with you. Stephen always nice to have you on. Ive got to say, youre looking spree, youre looking good, even though and i want to put this up, not to bring up any bad memories or anything you were here in september last time and just days after you were here, you had a heart attack. I want to apologize for how tough i was on you. laughter thats what happened. Gillibrand was her and her kidneys failed. I knocked on wood that night. Turns out, this is plastic. Stephen it is. It is. I apologize to you again. Its not your fault. Okay. Theres a lot to talk about in the world and the campaign. Id like to start off with the recent possibly war with iran. The United States, just to recap, we sent a drone strike at the president s command to kill head of the quds force qasem soleimani. Nikki haley has said the only people mourning soleimani are Democratic Leaders. Have you seen any Democratic Leaders mourning soleimani . Are you mourning soleimani . Anything youd like to say back with nikki haley right now, perhaps with a fragrant gesture . laughter no, nobody i know is mourning soleimani, but i tell you what, you know, stephen, i think about the modern history of this country, and i remember vietnam, that was my generation, and i remember the war in iraq. Those are the two worst Foreign Policy blunders in the modern history of this country, and both of those wars were built on lies. applause stephen i just want to point out that candidate trump agreed with you. Yeah, well stephen candidate trump agreed that iraq was the worst decision. Yeah, but heres the point the point is that both of those wars which caused such incredible suffering in our country 59,000 american soldiers dead as a result of the vietnam war, probably more died after they came back, a generation really enormously impacted. The war in iraq, 4500 of our people, hundreds of thousands of iraqis dead. We spent trillions of dollars that should be invested in healthcare, in education, in infrastructure. cheers and applause trillions of dollars spent in that war based on a law you remember. Ste sure, yeah. Ry ll yeah weere told we we told that saddam had mass weapons of mass destruction, chemical weapons tied al quaida, all alike, and all of that suffering. At the end of all of that, all of the death, all of the suffering, trillions of dollars of expenditures, we get booted out of iraq, they no longer want us there. So i will do everything that i can to stop a war with iran that i think will be a disaster. cheers and applause stephen the administration, as you was talking about earlier in the show, the administration sent representatives both in the military and from the cabinet to have a briefing at the senate yesterday. Were you at these briefings . Yes. Stephen mike lee called these insulting. Did you find them insulting . Well, i am so used to trump S Administration that nothing surprises me. laughter stephen isnt that part of the danger of thiS Administration that were becoming deafened to the lies. Yes. And mike lee is a conservative republican with whom i disagree with on almost everything but he and i had worked together because mike is maybe Old Fashioned enough to believe in the constitution of the United States. cheers and applause i know that is something and that is something that trump i think has not yet read or understands. laughter but what mike made public today which is true, i was there, in fact, signature right behind him when asked by the representatives of the military and the c. I. A. If, in fact, trump aassinatetheersh the le they could not give a clear answer on that. And here is the point that i know that Everybody Knows this, the constitution is extremely clear, it is the congress of United States that has warmaking powers, not the president. applause and that is why i have introduced legislation which would prevent spending giving trump one nickel of money to go to war in iran, and theres another good piece of legislation that, once again, would bring up the war powers act to make sure that he could not go to war unless he had the authorization of the congress. cheers and applause stephen it has been a long time, and correct me if im wrong here, but it has been a long time since congress has exerted that power. How do you think we got here where trump thinks he can act with such impunity . Youre absolutely right, and it is unfortunate situation that that has existed, and ill tell you what i think the answer is, you know, and ive got to say this. It is a politician, the president gets up there, were going to be tough, these are evil guys, were going to war, wow your poll ratings go up and people say, wait a minute, what are the unintended consequences of that . How many people will die . How much is it going to cost us . Oh, candidate x or congressman x is soft on terror. You know, congressman x, he doesnt want to protect america, all right, and i really get very angry at that approach, because we sit in the congress in our beautiful rooms, beautiful studio over here, and we do not know what war is about. We divert the former chairman of the Senate Committee on veterans affairs. I met with the mothers of the young men who lost their lives in the war, met with the wives, met with the kids, i met with the soldiers who came back without arms and legs, who are dealing with ptsd today. War is a horror, and its time politicians understood that weve got to do everything humanly possible to avoid war. cheers and applause and ive got to say, stephen, you know, i have to say that i know it is not sexy to talk ability diplomacy, it is not sexy to talk about making sure that we have a great state department with people who know the culture and the language of countries all over the world. Ive met some of the people, they do a great job. It aint sexy. It is much more powerful, its better tv to talk about how were going to kill this one and kill that one. But i believe the American People are sick and tired of end less wars, they want to improve lives for the American People and, you know cheers and applause stephen some people justifying this are pointing at the aumf of 2002. Right. Stephen the authorization of use of military force following the attacks of 9 11. Right. Stephen i read the text the other night, it specifically says you can only go after people youre authorized to go after people, the president , is and this president as well, to go after people who were responsible for the attacks or who aided in those attacks. And the 9 11 Commission Said there was no connection with iran. Right. Stephen so how can they still justify using that . Because you have you know, youre raising the right question. Stephen thank you. laughter you have an administration which is led by a president who is a pathological liar. applause honestly, stephen, i disagree with many members in congress, theyre not pathological liars, but this president , honestly, in my view, does not understand the constitution, does nsprulas not particularly interested in democratic procedures, and that is why i consider him to be the most dangerous president in the modern history of this country, and i inte